1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a laser fixing device and an image forming apparatus.
2. Related Art
Image forming apparatuses using a powder-type toner are widely used, which transfer a toner image formed by attaching toner to the surface of a recording medium and heat the toner image so as to be fixed. As the types of fixing the toner image, a contact type and a non-contact type are known.
The fixing device of the contact type includes: a heating member, for example, having an endless peripheral surface to be heated; and a pressurizing member that is brought into contact with the heating member. Such a fixing device applies heat and pressure to a toner image while a recording medium is interposed between the heating member and the pressurizing member, and thereby fixing the toner image on the recording medium.
On the other hand, a fixing device of the non-contact type is not brought into contact with the recording medium. Thus, the fixing device of the non-contact type, compared to the above-described contact-type device, has superior versatility with the recording medium and realize high-speed processing. As such a non-contact type fixing device, there is a device that heats a toner image formed on the transported recording medium so as to be fixed by intermittently turning on a flash lamp disposed so as to face the transport path of the recording medium.